Workers' Exposure to Air Pollution in Urban Uganda

Last registered on August 14, 2024
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Pre-Trial

Trial Information

General Information

Title
Workers' Exposure to Air Pollution in Urban Uganda
RCT ID
AEARCTR-0014162
Initial registration date
August 13, 2024

Initial registration date is when the trial was registered.

It corresponds to when the registration was submitted to the Registry to be reviewed for publication.

First published
August 14, 2024, 2:53 PM EDT

First published corresponds to when the trial was first made public on the Registry after being reviewed.

Locations

Country
Uganda
Region

Primary Investigator

Name
Jeanne Sorin
Affiliation
University of Chicago
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Other Primary Investigator(s)

PI Name
Vittorio Bassi
PI Affiliation
University of Southern California
Contact Investigator
PI Name
Tommaso Porzio
PI Affiliation
Columbia University
Contact Investigator
PI Name
Matthew Kahn
PI Affiliation
University of Southern California
Contact Investigator
PI Name
Nancy Lozano Gracia
PI Affiliation
World Bank
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Additional Trial Information

Status
Completed
Start date
2022-02-28
End date
2022-07-31
Keywords
Environment & Energy, Firms & Productivity
Additional Keywords
Air Pollution ; Uganda ; Misperception ; Knowledge
JEL code(s)
D21, J20, J31, O20, Q52, Q53
Secondary IDs
Prior work
This trial does not extend or rely on any prior RCTs.
Abstract
Air pollution is high but unevenly distributed within African cities. In principle, individuals could thus avoid severe health costs by working in the cleaner parts of the city. Yet, avoidance and in place adaptation depends on individuals' beliefs about the levels and spatial distribution of pollution. We conduct an information experiment to assess awareness of pollution and the scope for improved information to increase adaptation and avoidance.
External Link(s)

Registration Citation

Citation
Bassi, Vittorio et al. 2024. "Workers' Exposure to Air Pollution in Urban Uganda." AEA RCT Registry. August 14. https://doi.org/10.1257/rct.14162-1.0
Sponsors & Partners

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Experimental Details

Interventions

Intervention(s)
We test for information frictions on pollution levels in our sample of manufacturing firms in urban Uganda by using an experiment where we estimate how the provision of some initial information about local pollution impacts the willigness to pay (WTP) for more information about the spatial distribution of air quality within the city.
Intervention Start Date
2022-02-28
Intervention End Date
2022-07-31

Primary Outcomes

Primary Outcomes (end points)
Willingness to Pay for Air Pollution Maps and Productivity Maps.
Primary Outcomes (explanation)

Secondary Outcomes

Secondary Outcomes (end points)
Secondary Outcomes (explanation)

Experimental Design

Experimental Design
0. Before the start of this experiment with the firm owners, we calculated measures of grid cell-level pollution and customer access / profitability using our baseline data, conducted with the same sample of firms. Grid cell are 500m * 500m and each sub county has multiple grid cells.
1. We ask all firm owners to estimate the relative levels of pollution and customer demand at the premises of their firm, compared to other locations in their sub-county.
2. We randomly divide all firms with available information on actual pollution in their grid-cell into a treatment group that receives information on the actual relative pollution levels near their firm compared to the rest of their sub-county, and a control group that does not receive any information. Similarly, we divide all firms with available information on actual profitability into a treatment group that receives additional information on local relative profitability, and a control group. The two treatments are independent.
3. We ask all firm owners (in both treated and control groups) whether they would be willing to give back part of their compensation for the study (UGX 5,000, or about $1.5) to acquire: (i) a map of relative pollution and (ii) a map of relative profitability in their sub-county (that we compiled with the baseline data). We first offer them to buy either map for a high price of UGX 3,000, so that they would have to choose at most one between the two. Then, for the maps not chosen at the high price, we again offer them for a medium price (UGX 2, 000). If at least one map is still not purchased at this price, we make one last offer at a low price (UGX 1, 000).
4. We calculate 2 outcome variables for WTP: a dummy if the owner is willing to pay the high price for the pollution/profitability map, and a variable taking values 0 to 3, depending on whether the owner is willing to pay the high (3), medium (2), low price (1), or no price at all (0).
Experimental Design Details
Randomization Method
Randomization done beforehand via computer (R)
Randomization Unit
Individual
Was the treatment clustered?
No

Experiment Characteristics

Sample size: planned number of clusters
Productivity information experiment: 622 firm owners
Pollution information experiment: 499 firm owners

Eligibility criteria to be included in each experiment
- being part of the 1,027 firms in our baseline data with valid coordinates
- being part of the 52 sampled sub counties
- having non-missing revenue information
- being located in a sub-county with at least 3 grid-cells with non-missing revenue or pollution information, respectively
- having non-missing measure of market access (revenues) or pollution in the firm's grid-cell, respectively
Sample size: planned number of observations
Productivity information experiment: 622 firm owners Pollution information experiment: 499 firm owners
Sample size (or number of clusters) by treatment arms
Productivity information experiment: 309 control firms, 313 treatment firms
Pollution information experiment: 258 control firms, 241 treatment firms
Independent treatments.
Minimum detectable effect size for main outcomes (accounting for sample design and clustering)
Supporting Documents and Materials
IRB

Institutional Review Boards (IRBs)

IRB Name
University of Southern California Institutional Review Board
IRB Approval Date
2021-04-23
IRB Approval Number
UP-20-00923
Analysis Plan

Post-Trial

Post Trial Information

Study Withdrawal

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Intervention

Is the intervention completed?
Yes
Intervention Completion Date
July 31, 2022, 12:00 +00:00
Data Collection Complete
Yes
Data Collection Completion Date
July 31, 2022, 12:00 +00:00
Final Sample Size: Number of Clusters (Unit of Randomization)
Was attrition correlated with treatment status?
Final Sample Size: Total Number of Observations
Final Sample Size (or Number of Clusters) by Treatment Arms
Data Publication

Data Publication

Is public data available?
No

Program Files

Program Files
Reports, Papers & Other Materials

Relevant Paper(s)

Reports & Other Materials